


To Know Weakness

by Wadamwoltron



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: M/M, adadshi, adashi baby, adashi being dads, fan character, married adashi, time skip
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-07
Updated: 2019-12-07
Packaged: 2021-02-25 23:21:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,292
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21703639
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wadamwoltron/pseuds/Wadamwoltron
Summary: Adam always thought himself to be a man of great resolve and strong constitution, but he finds himself shaken once he becomes a father.
Relationships: Adam/Shiro (Voltron)
Comments: 1
Kudos: 13





	To Know Weakness

Few things could rouse Takashi Shirogane from a deep sleep. A peck to the forehead from his husband could only bring him halfway. The swirling bitter scent of coffee brought him 75%. His lips being enveloped in a warm macchiato kiss gently tugged him the rest of the way. Even before Adam began those practices, not even a Garrison alarm call or a distress signal from deep space could shake him fast enough. Shiro often chuckled at how long it took for him to regain consciousness, even back in the day when he was younger, more agile, more alert. Only the loudest of Allura’s calls to action could tear his eyelids open. However, in the recent weeks, there was one certain thing Shiro found to rouse him instantly. 

One little sob was all it took for the new father to be on his feet, mere seconds away from scooping up his crying baby into his arms and holding her close. Though Bee was a remarkably healthy infant, Adam and Shiro learned quickly that she was notoriously fussy for not much reason. Adam, having been by the side of younger twin sisters growing up, understood that sometimes babies simply cry, and no matter how earth-shattering the tiny pinched face of your daughter can be, sometimes the best course of action is to simply let her sob it out. Shiro refused to abide by such callousness. 

Bee’s crib rested by Shiro’s side of the bed, and sometimes before Adam could even be roused all the way by the noise, their infant was already cradled against his husband; though most of the time it was the rustling of Shiro hastily reconnecting his Altean arm to his stub that alerted Adam first. Though the latter couldn’t help but smile at the urgency and devotion with which his love jumped to action to hold their daughter safely, he was often plagued with the remembrance of his rationale. In the past several weeks, Adam had mentioned that infants could gain a certain dependency if a parent constantly answers as soon as they cry. The child begins to recognize that they can only be put to sleep in their parent’s arms, and thus the eventual transition to placing the baby in their own room becomes much more difficult. Or at least that’s what he had learned.

“All you need to do if she’s crying in the night is check if she’s hungry or needs a change. If she’s just tired, she’ll eventually fall back asleep on her own,” Adam preached. Though he’d be lying to say he too hadn’t felt himself tugged upwards by the heartstrings each time his daughter let out a cry. His instinct was to rush to her side as well, swaddle her in his love, reassure her that her Baba was there and everything was going to be okay. It was easier, however, to adhere to his policies when he wasn’t the one to reach her instantly. Though he felt his heart being consumed from the inside out when their daughter cried, Adam had always maintained his composure when he turned to see her sobs fading away against his love’s chest. He recognized the feeling well. The flow of words gently chiding his husband for strengthening dependency came easier when he knew she was safe and warm in his arms, and Adam pretended he wouldn’t have acted the same if he was the one to reach Bee first. Though logically he knew it to be a poor idea in the long haul, Adam was never one to simply ignore it when Shiro asked for help in rocking her back to sleep.

“Dear, she’s okay. She’s just tired, she doesn’t understand yet that falling asleep will make that go away, so all she can do is cry,” Adam muttered one night, face pressed into their bedsheets while one hand lazily stroked across Shiro’s back. The latter was hunched over the side of their bed, carefully cradling his daughter against his chest as she stained his shirt wet. His eyes were weighed down with exhaustion, heavy circles lining the tired slate gray in his irises as he turned to look back at his husband. 

“But look at her! She’s so upset, we can’t leave her like this. She’ll fall asleep faster if I’m rocking her anyway. Here, help me,” Shiro retorted, standing up to hold his baby out for Adam while Shiro climbed back into bed. Adam couldn’t refuse either of their pained faces, and sat up to support Bee’s head as she was delicately placed in his palms. She opened her waterlogged eyes upon the sensation of being transferred, and halted her sobs for a moment in her confusion. Her Baba smiled down at her, tired and weak, but still genuine all the same. 

Adam believed himself a man of unbroken strength. Few things could shake him now after the hardships he’d endured over the years. And they were hard indeed. It was agony to survive how Adam did, and yet the intensity of his sorrows had dwindled over the years, and only his strength remained. Though as he gazed down at his daughter, he came to notice how much easier it seemed to pull himself from the wreck of a plane crash in comparison.

A sharp hiccup followed by a slurry of sobs erupted from the baby once more, and Adam’s chest tightened. How could copiloting a warship feel so trivial now, against the weakness he felt to see his daughter cry. Adam drew her in close, placing a kiss on her mess of wispy curls. It seemed no amount of battling aliens could rattle his resolve quite like this. The man only chuckled to himself, a rhythmic pulsing of his chest that began to ease his baby’s tears as she pressed against her father. Shiro caught him whispering calming words in Urdu as he slipped back under the covers.

“Your walls are breaking down,” he teased. “Whatever happened to letting her cry it out?” Adam sighed in response.

“Y’know, it was so easy to ignore when it was my sisters, when I was a kid. It was almost white noise. But with Beatriz,” he stroked her plush cheek with a lazy thumb, “it’s the most important thing in the world, to get her happy again. When it’s your own daughter, how can you ignore it?” Shiro snuck his torso behind Adam and drew him in close, so that both fathers could be snuggled near Bee. Adam carefully adjusted to slide her into place against Shiro’s stomach and the side of his own chest, a perfectly-sized divet between the two for their baby to begin her descent into sleep once more. 

“So you finally understand,” Shiro joked through a whisper. 

“I always understood,” Adam responded, tossing his head into the crook of Shiro’s shoulder. “I just thought I could be ready to combat it.” He cupped his hand overtop Bee’s stomach, feeling her warmth rise and fall more steadily as her tears subsided. She let out a yawn before her eyes fluttered, and that was it.

“You don’t have to combat it, Adam.” Shiro let out a sigh, his own muscles beginning to buckle under the weight of exhaustion. Some time passed before Shiro’s head flopped gently upon Adam’s hair, his sighs turning to weak snores. Adam remained awake, keeping watch over the two loves of his life. He chewed on the words for a moment, mulling over the things he had learned about parenting over the years and the textbooks. And yet whatever practical knowledge he had instilled within himself was no match against his love for his daughter and his husband. "You don’t have to combat it, Adam."

"Yeah, I guess I don’t."


End file.
